Government report recommends overhaul of land use and huge reductions in CO2 emission
The Department for Energy and Climate Change have published a report on their Global Calculator, a model which sets out what the ‘average lifestyle’ would need to be to meet climate change targets in 2050.
The project was based on a question:
“Is it physically possible to meet our climate targets and ensure everyone has good living standards by 2050?”
This is defined as all ten billion people in the world eating well, travelling more and living in more comfortable homes, whilst simultaneously ‘reducing emissions to a level consistent with a 50 per cent chance of 2°C warming’.
If this is to be achieved, the report says, the amount of CO2 emitted globally per unit of electricity needs to fall by at least 90 per cent by 2050. The proportion of people who heat their homes using other sources – electric or zero carbon – should rise to 25 to 50 per cent globally by 2050.
It was calculated that fossil fuel use must fall from being 82 per cent of our primary energy supply today to 40 per cent by 2050, with a sharp fall in coal demand required.
As well as transforming technology, there needs to be a change in how we use land resources, which will have a significant impact on people’s diets. In particular, the report concludes, we must make use of forests as a valuable carbon sink, and protect and expand them globally by five to 15 per cent.
In conjunction with this, the report recommends that people change their eating habits in order to maximise the land area required to produce food. It says that switching from beef consumption towards pork, poultry, vegetables and grains will significantly improve land use:
“Currently an area the size of a football pitch can be used to produce 250kg of beef, 1,000kg of poultry (both fed on grains and residues) or 15,000 of fruit and vegetables.
“In 2050, if everyone switched to the healthy diet as recommended by the World Health Organisation (2,100 calories on average, of which 160 calories is meat), this could save up to 15 GtCO2e in 205011 as the freed up land is used for forest or bioenergy.”
This would entail a big overhaul of lifestyle for many people, and worrying changes for farmers. It is for this reason that the report emphasises the importance of strong leadership from businesses, civil society and politicians, in the run up to the UN convention in December of this year.
26 Responses to “Diet is crucial in the fight to meet climate change targets”
sarntcrip
DON’T BLAME THE COWS THEY WERE HERE LONG BEFORE CLIMATE CHANGE BUT
BLOCK FRACKING WITH PEOPLE POWER
sarntcrip
SIMPLY A GOVT. DIVERSION FROM FRACKING UNDER YOUR HOUSE
CB
Biofuels are carbon neutral!
Anything that comes from the biosphere is all essentially carbon-neutral, including cows.
I suspect your source is double-counting the carbon that is generated by animal agriculture, but I’m not sure. It’s actually surprisingly common. There was a study on corn ethanol that came out a few months ago that came to precisely the wrong conclusion because of a failure to understand how the short carbon cycle works.
The other ecological impacts of animal agriculture are not in dispute, nor is it in dispute that with our current system, animal agriculture requires the burning of more fossil fuels than plant agriculture.
…which is why if someone wants to make a positive change now, becoming vegetarian is actually a very effective way to do that.
CB
No.
The reason our system is dangerous has to do with its historical development, not any physical impediment.
Nobody has to burn fossils to lead a comfortable lifestyle.
That’s pretend.
ReduceGHGs
“Anything”? Really? Coal comes from the biosphere and burning it at rates anywhere near what we do now is NOT “carbon-neutral”.
And as for cow, again, … “A life-cycle analysis conducted by EWG that took into account the production and distribution of 20 common agricultural products found that red meat such as beef and lamb is responsible for 10 to 40 times as many greenhouse gas emissions as common vegetables and grains.”